Indulgent Spiced Apple Butter Streusel Pancakes

Winter weekends call for cozy breakfast extravagances!  Spiced Apple Butter Streusel Pancakes are just the ticket.  Fluffy buttermilk pancakes with an oatmeal topping coupled with apple butter will start your day off right! 

“Apple Butter pancakes are one of my favorite breakfast treats in fall and winter. I love apples and cinnamon!”  Joyce Pinson, Friends Drift Inn

Spiced Apple Butter Streusel Pancakes At-A-Glance

Prep time 15 minutes   Cook Time 20 minutes Total Time 35 minutes

(Time would be substantially reduced if using a griddle and cooking several pancakes at a time)

Yield 6 pancakes

Ingredients  All-Purpose Flour – Oats – Unsalted Butter – Eggs – Buttermilk – Brown Sugar, Friends Drift Inn Spiced Apple Butter – Cinnamon – Nutmeg – Ginger – Salt, Butter or Oil for cooking

Equipment  2 mixing bowls – Measuring Cups and Spoons – Pastry Cutter, Non-Stick Skillet or Griddle, Pancake flipper – Squeeze Bottle for apple butter topping

 How Do I Cook Pancakes With a Streusel Topping?

I am a big fan of cast iron skillets – but NOT for this recipe.  Use a non-stick skillet for best results!

Why you ask? Because these apple butter pancakes are a little finnicky. But so worth it!

1. Once you have everything mixed and your skillet hot, put oil or a small pat of butter in the skillet.
2. Pour a 1/3 cup of batter into skillet and immediately add a heaping tablespoon full of streusel topping to pancake.
3. Like all buttermilk pancakes, you wait for the edges to dry up a little and pull away from the pan.  The surface bubbles will begin to pop.   Usually about 1 minute and 45 seconds for me. 
4. Flip the pancake. 
5. Here is where it gets tricky.  Cook about a minute or so on the streusel side. Poke around with the flipper to make sure pancake is not sticking.
6. When appears done stack on plates.

You may need to add more butter or oil between batches.  The key is to keep the streusel from sticking.

If you opt for a bigger batch, place pancakes on a lined baking pan, cover and keep in oven at about 200 until ready to serve.

How Do I Know if the Streusel is the Right Consistency?

With most recipes that call for a streusel topping, the idea is to mix until it looks like coarsely ground cornmeal. 

With the addition of oats, the topping for these pancakes is a little lumpier.  Do not worry.  It tastes great!

I Don’t See the Streusel!

This pancake recipe is not like a muffin streusel.  You really cannot see it; maybe a few flakes of oatmeal are evident.  That is ok. 

These pancakes are a tad darker in color than your usual stack of griddle cakes.  With apple butter stirred into the buttermilk batter, the pancakes brown up.  Don’t be alarmed.

When you take a bite, first you will have a fluffy pancake feel but then there is that little soft crunch.  It is unexpected, and a pleasant surprise.  The contrast of textures between the buttermilk pancakes, streusel topping, and luscious mouth feel of apple butter drizzled on the stack makes me happy!

I hope it makes you smile too!

Will Apple Butter Pancakes Work as Silver Dollar Pancakes?

Anything is possible.  But because the streusel tends to stick, I don’t have the patience to flip that many little “might stick” pancakes.  Do you?

Apple Butter Pancakes Loves Buttermilk

If you are not cooking and baking with buttermilk, you are doing yourself a disservice. 

Frankly, I never ever drink it.  The tang is a bit much for me.

But oh!  For a fluffy pancake, for an awesome rise in quick breads, waffles and muffins buttermilk is boss!

If you want a tender crumb and a beautiful golden-brown finish buttermilk is your friend.

We always use it in pancakes including our original Apple Butter Pancakes and our favorite Blueberry Pancakes.

 

Spiced Apple Butter Pancakes for Breakfast

The New York Times Cooking section is a great source for recipes.  I thought you might laugh if I waxed poetic about how perfect buttermilk pancakes are.

Especially with warming spices.  Especially with spiced apple butter.  Especially when there is snow on the ground, and it is a lazy weekend. 

But if you are going to laugh about fancy words and idealist notions about buttermilk pancakes, check out this description from the  New York Times

Pancakes are the hero of the breakfast table, and their very taste can even be described as “deeply breakfasty”: eggy, salty, just this side of sweet. A little indulgent and yet still somehow appropriate first thing in the morning.

That about nails it – don’t you think?

Tips for Mixing Up Spiced Apple Butter Pancakes

• Whisk all the dry ingredients together, then make a well in the center.  Pour in buttermilk, crack the eggs, add the apple butter and stir in.
• Please do not overwork the batter.  Just stir until moistened.  Yes, the batter is lumpy.
• All the fancy chemistry terms that explain why buttermilk, baking soda and baking powder make pancakes fluffy are spot on.  Don’t mess with it!
• When you get the pancakes mixed, walk away.  Do you hear me? Walk away!
•  Let the better rest at least 3 minutes. 

Can I Make Pancake Batter Ahead of Time?

Yes.  Make batter, cover and refrigerate overnight.  If the batter seems stiff, add 1 teaspoon of buttermilk.

With the streusel, for best results make just before you are ready to cook.  If you make ahead, the butter tends to draw all the ingredients together – losing that crunchy streusel texture.

Do You Really Make Friends Drift Inn Apple Butter?

Friends Drift Inn Spiced Apple Butter with  has a flavor profile with cinnamon, ginger and other spices.  We especially like the gingery finish, a little warmth for cold mountain mornings.  A splash or two of bourbon adds to the warmth.

With no high fructose corn syrup, no added food colorings, and no added preservatives we think our apple butter is pretty darn good.

We are a small family owned business.  Between the four of us, we have touched every jar.

Like bourbon, our apple butter is made in small batches to assure the best quality.   We choose a variety of apples, many grown right here in Appalachia, to create the perfect flavor and texture. 

You can read my  “What is Apple Butter” article, which tells a little about apple varieties, how apple butter is used and why it is important to our family legacy.

Cinnamon – The Most Common Warming Spice

I take cinnamon for granted.  It is not one of those exotic spices that only the culinary geeks have heard of and used.  It is the spice in granny’s pantry and yours too.

Have you ever thought about how cinnamon is grown?

Most apple butters use a generous amount of cinnamon spice, aka cassia.  There are two types of cinnamon.

According to National Geographic writer Kelsey Nowakoski

By way of background, cassia is grown primarily in China, Vietnam, and Indonesia, while its rarer and more expensive relative, ceylon cinnamon, comes from Sri Lanka. Many people can’t taste the difference between the two types, but cassia is typically described as hotter and more intense than ceylon, which is regarded for its lighter, more complex flavor.

The article  got me to wondering just how cinnamon grows and how it is harvested.  You are never too old to learn!

Cultivating Cinnamon for Flavor

Quoting David Hanson, a documentary film maker who covered the Sumatra cinnamon harvest, Nowakoski writes:

“We were surprised that a common spice comes from such an unexpected source–the bark of an evergreen tree,” said David. The small-scale, traditional harvest of cassia is done in a hands-on, environmentally-friendly way. According to local farmers, the trees can be harvested about ten years after they’re planted, and many are left to mature much longer than that. The trees serve as a secondary income for local farmers and are harvested when a family needs money.

Who knew?

No matter what you are eating, stop and thank a farmer.  They work hard to eek out a living.  So very hard!

Try your hand at a stack of these streusel topped spiced apple butter pancakes – you won’t be disappointed!

Count how many farmers’ work is in that stack as you enjoy this fall favorite!

Choose Your Assortment

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